Faculty and Research Affiliates

Dr. Konsta Kotilainen is working at the intersections of world politics, economics, and philosophy. Currently, he is a postdoctoral researcher in the Project . Kotilainen defended his extensive doctoral dissertation in March 2024. The dissertation passed with distinction and the Department of Economics and Management of the University of Pavia has awarded it an international PhD Thesis Prize. With a , Kotilainen will turn this dissertation into a peer-reviewed book.

In addition to his alma mater, the University of Helsinki, Kotilainen has studied or conducted research at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Universidad Nacional de General San Martín in Buenos Aires, and . Kotilainen is the current editor of the . 

Konsta is available for secondary Master's thesis supervision upon approval.

Ville Eloranta is a Doctor of Engineering and Technology from Aalto University where he currently holds the position of Senior University Lecturer and Programme Programme Director of interdisciplinary International Design Business Management Master's Programme.

Eloranta is interested in organising around antirival resources and his research focuses on areas of business model innovation, leading interdisciplinary creative ecosystems, and on connecting design paradigms to management practise.  His recent work includes Digital Protocols as Accounting and Incentivization Mechanisms in Anti-Rival Systems: Developing a Shareable Non-Fungible Token (sNFT) (Hakanen, E., Eloranta, V., Marttila, J. & Amadae, S., 2023), Creation, Control, and Co-existence as the Foundations of Experiential Entrepreneurial Education (Ganoo, A. & Eloranta, V., 2022) and Forming digital commons: The role of signaling and sociology of translation in decentralized systems (Hakanen, E., Eloranta, V. & Shaw, C., 2022).

Eloranta has also worked as the Principal Investigator on European Union projects H2020 FET Open consortium ATARCA, EIT C-ACCELERATE, and EU ATTRACT. In 2020 he won the EIC Blockchain for Social Good Prize together with Pekka Nikander.

Daria Gritsenko is an Assistant Professor in Russian and Eurasian Studies in the University of Helsinki. Within the University she is also affiliated with the Alexander Institute as well as the Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS). She holds both a PhD and the title of a Docent from the Faculty of Social Sciences in the University of Helsinki. During her career she has worked as a visiting researcher in the Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Spain), UiT The Arctic University of Norway (Norway), Hokkaido University (Japan), University of Exeter (UK) and in the George Washington University (USA).



Gritsenko's research interests lie within the fields of public policy, digital transformations and governance. She has a broad background in political science and at the moment she focuses especially on the role played by digitalization, ‘datification’ and algorithms in public administration, economic and political governance within the Russian Arctic. She is also the founder of the Digital Russia Studies, a network uniting researchers from various disciplines whose work is located at the intersection of ‘digital’ and ‘social’ in the Russian context.



Gritsenko´s research has been published in various political science outlets, including Energy Policy, Marine Policy, Energy Research and Social Science as well as Maritime Policy and Management.

Dr. Monique Taylor is a University Lecturer and Docent in World Politics in the Faculty of Social Sciences, with affiliations at King’s College London and the , where she serves as an Associated Senior Research Fellow. She holds a doctorate in International Political Economy from the University of Queensland and has previously worked at several global top 50 universities in Singapore and Australia.

Taylor specialises in global political economy and international relations, focusing on how shifts in global power, technological change, and state-led economic strategies, notably those advanced by China, are reshaping the global political and economic order. Her current research examines monetary governance, authoritarianism, and the transformation of regional security architectures, especially in the Indo-Pacific. From 2023 to 2025, she is co-coordinating a €1.5 million Horizon Europe Twinning project, , in partnership with Palacký University in the Czech Republic.

She is the author of two books,  (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014) and  (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022). Together, these works explore the intersection of state power, economic strategy, and governance, offering new insights into China’s role in the global political economy.

Teivo Teivainen is a Professor of World Politics at the University of Helsinki. His research focuses on global politics, democracy, freedom of expression, global governance, global political economy, and human rights. His recent publications include: Fuzzy Privatization and Decline of Democracy at the University of Helsinki (Sundell, T. & Teivainen, T., 20 Apr 2017), Occupy Representation and Democratize Prefiguration: Speaking for Others in Global Justice Movements (Teivainen, T., 2016), and Global Democratization without Hierarchy or Leadership? the World Social Forum in the Capitalist World (Teivainen, T., 2012).

Previously Teivainen has worked as a docent in Development Studies at the University of Helsinki, as a Research Director at the Collegium for Advanced Studies at the University of Helsinki, and as Research Director of the Centre of Excellence of Global Governance Research. He has also been a visiting professor in numerous universities abroad, including in the State University of Rio de Janeiro and in the University of San Marcos in Peru.

During his career, Teivainen has gained national and international recognition and won various prestigious awards, including the Amartya Sen Prize 2015 at the Yale University together with Dr Matti Ylönen, as well as The Academy of Finland Recognition Award in 2006. In 2000, his Doctoral Dissertation received the Award for the Best Thesis on Political Economy of the World-Systems by the American Sociological Association.

Dr. Hanna Wass is the Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Helsinki. She is an expert on political participation, representation, citizen participation and public opinion. Wass is also a renowned public figure and expert in Finland, participating actively in political debates and analysis.

Recently, Wass has published widely on voting, sustainable economic policies and their relation to democracy, political participation, the Finnish NATO membership, and a fair university. Her recent publications include: Healthy citizens, healthy democracies? A review of the literature (2023 Gidengil, E. & Wass,H.), With pulling ties, electoral participation flies: factors mobilising turnout among non-resident Finnish voters (2023 Peltoniemi, J, Nemcok, M. & Wass, H.), and Editorial: “Health and Political Behavior”: Towards an Integrative Approach (2021, Wass, H & Gidengil, E).

Wass also has led international and national consortia funded by the , , , and the European Commission.